Durbin wary of Sessions' history on race

Sen. Dick Durbin said Wednesday there are “elements” of Jeff Sessions’ background that “raise questions” about alleged racial insensitivities — signaling that the Alabama senator’s past comments on race will be a major focal point of his confirmation hearing next week.

Sessions, whom President-elect Donald Trump intends to nominate as attorney general, came under fire more than 30 years ago for accusations that he made racially charged remarks as a federal prosecutor. Those allegations derailed Sessions’ bid for a lifetime appointment to the federal bench in 1986.

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Though Durbin, the second-ranking Senate Democrat, declined to call Sessions racist, he acknowledged that “in the past, there were questions raised on his views on race from a lot of different perspectives.” Durbin, an Illinois Democrat,) met privately with Sessions on Wednesday for an extensive conversation about how he would approach his job as attorney general and said the nominee will “get plenty of questions” on race and related issues during his confirmation hearing, which begins Jan. 10.

“I would say there certainly are elements in his background that raise questions,” Durbin told reporters Wednesday when asked whether it was a legitimate criticism that Sessions is racially insensitive. “He said several times, point blank, that this was not an issue as far as he was concerned. He believed that everybody deserved fair treatment.”

Sessions’ team has pushed back vigorously at accusations of racial insensitivity. They point out that as a federal prosecutor, Sessions has gone after members of the Ku Klux Klan, and they’ve enlisted prominent black leaders to testify to the Alabama senator’s character.

Earlier Wednesday, Albert Turner Jr., commissioner of Perry County, Alabama, endorsed Sessions. Sessions prosecuted Turner’s parents in a voter fraud case that played a starring role in the race allegations that sank his effort to get confirmed to the federal judiciary 30 years ago.

“My differences in policy and ideology with him do not translate to personal malice,” the younger Turner said in a statement Wednesday. “He is not a racist. As I have said before, at no time then or now has Jeff Sessions said anything derogatory about my family. He was a prosecutor at the federal level with a job to do.”

But Durbin signaled that his concerns extend beyond Sessions’ decades-old remarks to the conservative Alabama senator’s views on voter identification laws and the 2013 Supreme Court decision that invalidated key provisions of the Voting Rights Act. Durbin even said he gave Sessions a book: “White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide” by Carol Anderson, which chronicles the issue of race in America since the Civil War.

“The Voting Rights Act is a major part” of the book, Durbin said. “I’m hoping he’ll take a look at it.”

The Illinois senator didn’t say whether he is prepared to announce his opposition to Sessions becoming the nation’s chief law enforcement official. But Durbin delved into unusually extensive detail about his one-on-one meeting with Sessions — a courtesy sit-down that is a standard feature of the Senate confirmation process.

He noted to Sessions that the Justice Department Civil Rights Division will soon release a report on the use-of-force practices of the Chicago Police Department, and said Sessions told him he was “not prepared to commit” to following through on DOJ’s yet-to-be-issued recommendations. The senator said he also pressed Sessions on boosting key Justice Department grants that would aid cities such as Chicago. Sessions “was not prepared to make that commitment,” Durbin said.

“I know nominees are cautious in these meetings and they should be and I guess I understand that,” Durbin said. But “this seems to me a very easy question to answer.”

Durbin also outlined his well-known differences between himself and Sessions on the issue of immigration and criminal justice reform.

On immigration, Sessions “repeatedly” stressed to Durbin: “I will follow the law Congress passes,” according to Durbin’s retelling. The Democrat believes an attorney general must exercise prosecutorial discretion, especially when it comes to enforcing immigration laws.

And although Durbin and Sessions may have teamed up together in the past to reduce sentencing disparities for crack and powder cocaine, Durbin also noted that Sessions is still resistant to another criminal justice reform effort: legislation written by Durbin and Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) that would reduce other mandatory minimum sentences for other nonviolent offenders.

“There were no breakthroughs in terms of his positions by Sen. Sessions. He and I are pretty familiar with one another’s positions,” Durbin said. Of the attorney general job, Durbin added, it’s “one that requires a much bigger view of the world than any one of us would have as a United States senator.”